Living near green space makes little or no difference in how much
people exercise during their leisure time, Dutch researchers said on
Wednesday.

In fact, people who live closest to green areas in urban or rural
areas walk and cycle less often and for shorter amounts of time than
other residents, they reported in the journal BioMed Central Public
Health.

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"We found that there was either no relationship or only a small one
between green space and physical activity," said Jolanda Maas, a
researcher at the Nivel Institute in Utrecht, who led the study.
"People with more green space walk and cycle less often in their
leisure time."

People with 20 percent of green space walked around 250 minutes each
week during their leisure time compared to 180 minutes -- more than an
hour less -- for those surrounded by 80 percent of green space.

This may be because people in less urban environments need to use
their cars more to get to places such as shops, schools and the
doctor's office, Maas said.

Living near green space also made no difference in whether people
met national health recommendations to get 30 minutes of exercise
daily, according to a survey of 5,000 residents across the Netherlands.

"An important implication of the study is when you just look at the
availability of green space it is not true people are just more
physically active," Maas said. "This study shows you don't really need
green space."